Yep, that’s exactly what it looks like. Same contract, but the $11M 2023 salary was slashed to $2M. It may sound ruthless, but everyone knows beforehand that the signing bonus rules, right?
2024 is a void year to spread out the signing bonus, as I understand it. I think that was in the original contract too.
Wait so he doesn’t have to earn the signing bonus in '24? Lol
wish lions knew the voidable years trick in 2014
Didn’t we basically have to do something like this anyway so we can budget for our draft class and in season moves?
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First of all, I defer everything about salary cap to DeadStroke. But as a I recall, Romeo originally got a $14M signing bonus that was evenly spread over 4 years. So that’s spent already.
If the Lions knew that trick during the Patricia years, we’d be in even deeper doo-doo. 
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I would say the fact that holmes has pulled off what he has done so far in free agency without having to do a restructure for decker or ragnow, is fantastic. We still likely have a big v pay cut that will free up some more and give us the opportunity to sign 1 maybe 2 guys. I am thinking backup qb and maybe chark/dt
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Cutting Big V now would be such a total dick move… that isnt Brad. He is fair.
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Dude took a straight 9 mil pay cut
Wow
I love Romeo Okwara for that
Wanna play with your boy and win in the D? Sign here bud
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I dont think they were part of the CBA with the players association yet. Maybe @DeadStroke knows?
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Yes we need about 20 mil for rookies, in season, and practive squad
Exactly, slash your pay V and be the backup RG/RT
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The rumor was that Romeo and Big V had been talked to about this already. Otherwise if they were going to be cut they would have been before last week. They still could have dedicated either as a post june 1st cut. They just wouldnt have gotten the salary cap relief until June 1st if they went that route.
I said from the beginning that Big V and Romeo are lockerroom favorites and would be surprised if they were cut. I expected a pay cut long before the insider info rumor was discussed here.
I didnt expect them to spend this much in FA. So i will gladly eat crow there. Yum yum. But brad did it in both his way with 1 year prove it deals for good players coming off injury AND by taking advantage lf the post covid market. Only a few teams had real money to spend. That money went very fast for the most part. Brad sat back and grabbed an absolute gem that got left behind in CJG. I wanted us to draft him in the 4th or 5th round that year and i think the Saints took him in the 6th. He blew up at the senior bowl. (That’s why i like AA@3T and Darius Rush this year).
Edit im pretty sure Big V would start over GG if both are healthy. I see GG as the backup
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I expect there to be a significant playing time incentive. He only played in 10.5% of the snaps last year.
Something like 11% - $1M, 20% - an additional $1Mm, etc
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Lions and all NFL teams have used this since the early 2000’s, they started with rookie contracts and moved on to veteran contracts later. Several Lions players used void years, Suh had a void year.
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Next thing you know players will be paying to play for the Lions.
I mean keeping the Suh Matt Calvin hall of fame corp that should’ve been a championship team built around
And they still lost him ?
He was the lynchpin
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Yep, love that he willing to take the cut to play with his brother and the Lions.
Although, I doubt there would have been much of a market for him in free agency after the serious injury. He didn’t get a chance to show much last year. Good move for both Romeo and the team.
He should in theory be much healthier next year.
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Mayhew really screwed up with those contracts, he just thought everything would work out.
The same thing could have happened to Stafford and CJ, but they both wanted to be here and took deals despite the impending monstrous franchise tag.
Suh was about the money early in his career and made Mayhew pay for being financially irresponsible.
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Part of the reason for Romeo’s 2021 contract when we were cutting expenses ASAP was that he was a culture guy. So now he’s replacing the Brockers role of player/coach/mentor, except he may have some chops left at 2 years distance from his Achilles injury.
Where Halapoulivaati’s back rehab is at is murky for everyone outside of Dearborn, so we’ll see when we see.
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